Over the last year, I've made a post to this blog every weekday. This post brings it to a full year of doing that. When I started this blog, it was to help coienside with my book, Ship It. That book has taken a little longer to edit than I... Continue reading

In a world where all kinds of information are at our finger tips (literally), the old excuses of "I don't know how" just don't cut it any more. Sure, you may not know how right now, but there is nothing stopping you from figuring out how. You may not know... Continue reading

The biggest fear almost all of us hide behind is the fear of "what if I can't do it." This thought keeps us in hiding. It makes sure that we never try, but more importantly it makes sure that we never fail. I've explained how failure is a part of... Continue reading

The only way to get better is to break out of your comfort zone. The comfort zone feels nice but it's a dangerous place that lulls us into a false sense of security. Sure, we like it in the comfort zone, but too much time in this zone can result... Continue reading

Everyone has a dream. Occasionaly, some of us realize our dream. Some of us start to move towards our dream and then we stop. Why? Because of the commitment. To achieve your goals and (eventuall) your dreams you have to remain committed to them. You can't do something about your... Continue reading

A few years ago, I became the "king of 'no'" because I said "no" a lot. I said it a lot because it needed to be heard. At the time I had a manager who was trying to get me to do busy work that would take time away from... Continue reading

When you ship, you're putting it all out on the table. You're taking a chance that someone's going to like what you have to offer. You bare a little bit of yourself in what you ship. It doesn't matter if it's software code, a book, a painting, or a photograph.... Continue reading

Shipping is all about deciding. You decide to put in the work. You make thousands of tiny decisions about the what and how. You decide to ship your idea. Without decisions nothing happens. Things just stagnate. You decide each day to put a little effort in. It's you who decides... Continue reading

No one ever got good at something without trying it first. No one. Ever. One must try something, do it incorrectly (or poorly), muddle through a learning curve, and evetually (hopefully) become good at it. But none of that other stuff happens unless you try it. Continue reading

When we start a new hobby, project, or task we often have an end goal in mind. We usually have seen something that inspired us to take the steps to do something. Take photography as an example. Chances are you started doing photography because you saw a photograph that inspired... Continue reading

Deciding to ship comes down to two things: Deciding to ship and Shipping That's it. You decide to do it, then you do it. Might take time, but the end result is still the same. Ship it. The best time to ship it? Right now. This is go time. Decide... Continue reading

Ignore everyone! Okay. Maybe not everyone. But almost everyone. People like to tell you "it won't work" when what they really mean is "I can't make it work so it won't work." Those people are the ones that aren't doing the work. They're the ones sitting on the sidelines just... Continue reading

Making the decision to move on an idea you had means having to change your attitude. It means having to change your priorities. That decision requires a change in outlook. It requires a change of mind. Change is never easy. All those changes happen because you choose to change. Even... Continue reading

I've been reviewing my yearly and long term goals the past few days. It's a normal thing I do now every year. I sit down review the goals I had for the year and see where I landed. Sometimes I miss the mark completely. I either made no movement or... Continue reading

By now you've realized that the year is almost over and you've done very little, if anything towards your goals for the year. I know I am. Every year is a constant battle between personal change and bettermant versus contentment. We want to change but it often seems not badly... Continue reading

Ruts are easy to get into. They're even more difficult to get out of. Once we're in a rut we become a slave to it. Constantly making up excuses for not trying the new thing. Breaking out of a rut is a hard thing to do. Just ask anyone who's... Continue reading

You are your own worst enemy. In most cases of the "I can'ts" it's you that's blocking yourself. Not someone else. The reason you haven't written your book is because of you. Not because you don't have time or don't know how. Those kinds of excuses are easily remedied. No,... Continue reading

When adding new features, make sure you validate them. Don't just add them and hope that they get used. Check on them, see if people are using them, look at how your users use them. If you find that people aren't using them then you may need to reconsider them,... Continue reading

Nothing annoys me more then when I see or hear a manager say "you're not here enough" and when asked if that employee's work is suffering or if they're productivity is lessened they say "No, you're work is fine." If the work is fine, why does it matter how much... Continue reading

Testing isn't just part of your development or quality assurance cycles. It's also something you should be doing with adjustments you make to your products. If you're adding features you need to be paying close attention to how those features are being used and by whom. It's not just a... Continue reading

When killing features it's easy to use data to determine if a feature is worth killing. Maybe a feature isn't being used the way you thought it would be, maybe you inadvertantly turned into something you didn't mean to. It could be that people just aren't using it. Sure that... Continue reading

Your worst day will always be countered by a day that's as good as your worst one was bad. Just because you're having a bad day today where nothing works like you think or goes the way it should, doesn't give you an excuse to throw in the towel and... Continue reading

If you're working with other people to ship something and you want to keep the feature-creep at bay, you have to become intimatly familiar with two words. These two words will become your favorite words with regards to shipping product and keeping the craziness at bay. What are these two... Continue reading

Big projects, and even big tasks can seem daunting. You look at a list of things you need to do in order for something to be finished and it feels like it's going to take you weeks just based on the sheer number of items on the list. It can... Continue reading

If you're under the impression that shipping is the end game, you have the wrong impression. Shipping is only the end game to shipping. Getting it done. It's the end of you sitting on an idea and not doing anything about it. That's all that it's the end game of.... Continue reading